Chapter 27

  The way back is always faster–unless you run into a trio of redwhips. As the two retraced their steps and approached the bend, they kept hearing a noise that was un-rock like. At first the two had chalked it up to the wind, yet the sound increased the closer they came to the turn. The random cracks and rockslide noises increased and added a thwaping sound that was strange to both men. The moment they turned the corner, everything became clear.

  Three truck-sized, velvet crimson colored, exo-skeleton laden redwhips were whacking at the side of a spire. The large knots at the end of their pincers swung like eager wrecking balls hammering the stone. From their distance, they could only see when large chunks came off; otherwise the redwhips didn’t seem to be making any dents.

  Kopius’s heart rate picked up a few notches once his eyes focused on the lance sized stinger bobbing in the air. After a triple check on the stinger and size comparison of each whip, Kopius scootched out of sight as slowly as possible. Cici followed close behind.

  “I must have seen a baby whip,” Cici whispered, surprise evident on his face.

  “Dude,” Kopius whispered back. “Their stingers are the length of my arm.”

  Cici nodded, his face that of a man formulating something; hopefully a plan.

  With no immediate answer forthcoming, Kopius snaked his way back to get another look. The three redwhips continued to treat the column of the spire with ill regard. Their large mauling appendages thumping away at emotionless stone. Kopius pushed away any metaphors in his mind regarding banging one's head against a wall and observed. The creatures pounded at the column like circus folks putting up the big tent. They worked in unison until a large piece of the column broke free and crashed down the hill.

  The large stone slid half way down the slope, creating a miniature avalanche in the process. All types of boulders and debris raced down the hill and settled in the sea of stones below. The redwhips pranced around the sliding stones, their six webbed feet giving them plenty of traction. Then the three wannabe-scorpions pounced on the broken piece of spire as if it might get up and run away. One by one they drove stingers into the large stone, leaving Kopius with a WTF open mouth gape.

  A few seconds into the stone being stung, the boulder exploded into smaller chunks; the seared pieces flying off in random directions. Smoldering parts of the rock shot up the slope, across the slope and down the slope; one piece right in front of Kopius. He looked down at the smoking rock and saw what looked like part of a geode. He wanted to look closer but didn’t want to get down from the platform.

  Cici had finally wiggled his way back to have a look.

  “That was a mighty crash right there,” The big man whispered. “What happened?”

  “They broke a chunk out of that column,” Kopius said quietly, nodding in the general direction of the spire. “Did you know those stingers can cut into rock?”

  “Really?” Cici responded unconvinced.

  Kopius went on to explain what he saw while the three redwhips rummaged through the smoldering rocks; Cici listened intently. While the Bard was processing the information the monsters walked back to the spire and started thumping again.

  “We should get going while they're doing their thing,” Kopius suggested. He looked over the path of platforms and got into a crouched position. Avoiding the redwhips would be easy; avoiding a cascade of stones after they break the mountain—not so much. Before Cici could agree with him the spire sounded off and cracked again.

  Another piece of the column came crashing down and slid a little further than the last one. The redwhips raced after it, skewered it and within a few moments Cici witnessed the large rock exploding. A large chunk flew and then tumbled in their direction. It flipped and flopped across terrain until stopping a few yards shy of their viewing space. When the large portion of rock settled, it had a forest of milky-white, silver spectacled genomes.

  “That’s optical-quartz, lad,” Cici said, his face lighting up with a smile.

  “Lad.” The big man said now with a look of concern. “That’s optical-quartz.”

  “Is it a lot?” Kopius asked.

  “It’s enough!” Cici almost shouted, desperately pointing up the slope.

  “Enough for wha–,” Kopius asked as he turned to look. “–aaaat the fuuuck!?”

  As Kopius stared up the rocky slope where he saw two of the giant redwhips coasting down towards their prize. The two men froze in an attempt to be one with their surroundings; hopeful to blend in and go unnoticed. The monsters showed no sign of seeing them until they were about thirty yards away.

  One stopped about half way and started making head motions as if it were sniffing the air while the other made its way slowly to the smoldering chunk of spire. After its brief inspection, the thing reared back on its four hind legs and let out a gurgling type of roar.

  If Kopius and Cici were unsure if they had been seen, the sniffing redwhip–impressively–shot a stream of green liquid from its stinger. The liquid arced high in the air and sizzled as it etched into every rock it splashed on, making its way to the two men.

  Cici leaped back the way they had been coming from. Kopius kept going the way they were going, leaping through a few platforms before he heard Cici yell.

  “This way!” Cici bellowed, his voice loud enough to make the rock shiver.

  Kopius hit his brakes, slid to a stop, and turned around. In his brief change of direction he was able to get a lay of the land:

  Cici was leaping and bounding his way towards the gap that had turned them around; the redwhip nearest the smoldering rock of optical-quartz—adjacent the acid splashed platform—navigated the unstable terrain towards its prize; the other pair of redwhips remained high up the slope at the base of the spire, ignoring or uninterested in their companions gurgly grows; lastly, the acid spitting, reared back redwhip remained upright, seemingly unsure if it should move towards its food or attack Kopius for simply existing.

  In hindsight, had Kopius kept moving in his original direction none of what transpired next would have happened. Worst case scenario would’ve been him finding some off-shoot to wait in or, at least, avoiding the area until the monsters had moved on. Instead he pulled a rare maneuver and followed directions.

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  Upon completing his turn, Kopius wasted no time heading after Cici. As he leaped towards the nearest flat surface, the passive redwhip had nearly reached the optical-quartz which laid on the uphill side next to a platform. Its erect brethren let out another odd gurgled roar before charging down the rickety rocks, right at Kopius. The aggressive redwhip created a small avalanche as it hurtled its way down the slope with little regard to safety.

  Kopius landed his jump, took two running steps and leaped again towards the next flat rock.

  Everything kept happening all at once or in slow motion. One moment Kopius was flying through the air, simultaneously tracking two redwhips, an agile Bard, and a safe landing spot; the next his feet hit solid rock and quickly prepared for the next jump. If things hadn’t gone sideways enough, Kopius was about to be on the wrong side of an ever growing stone shard avalanche.

  The head-on nature of the aggressive redwhip meant it was coming down on Kopius diagonally instead of straight downhill. Its reckless nature caused many of the loose, razor-rock to create a sizable cascade down the slope in a kind of mudslide equivalent fashion. If Kopius didn’t pick up the pace he would either have to hit the brakes to turn around–again–or get swept up in the wave of stone shards; find out if ‘death by a thousand cuts’ is a thing.

  Treating his predicament like approaching a yellow light; Kopius hit the proverbial gas. His next leap left him with only one more platform to land upon before returning to the acid splotched rock he had originally fled from.

  His mind was free of sound and clutter as his feet skipped across the rock, barely touching the stone in his flight. His vision was clear, practically surreal as life seemed to come at him from a third-person view. This heightened sense of perspective showed him that he was about to thread a needle and he was the thread.

  The passive redwhip had reached its meal and hovered over the optical-quartz like a dragon protecting its trove. Its tail snaked in the air, daring Kopius to come within distance. The maul shaped pinchers appendage circled in place, like a baseball player anxiously awaiting a slow pitch softball.

  In the three running steps he took before jumping to the next platform, the redwhip chasing him altered its course, creating an impromptu, three way race all coalescing at the acid burned platform. Kopius, the aggressive redwhip and the landslide of a bazillion of rocks were all careening towards a finish line and not a one of them were slowing down.

  There was a math formula for what was happening here. It likely calculated speed, distance, and mass as well as a few other factors; velocity maybe. In one of his slow-motion moments–two steps from jumping towards the acidic platform where he started–Kopius recognized he had limited options.

  On one hand the aggressive redwhip and the landslide of shards moved with downhill momentum, picking up more speed than Kopius could account for.

  On the other hand, if he were to make the jump without incident, the passive redwhip was basically lying in wait; ready to shank or smush depending on its mood.

  Threading the needle would require several parts of ‘execution’ and many parts of ‘luck.’ He needed to clear the jump, not get skewered by the aggressive redwhips, avoid the razor sharp shards of rocks, dodge the passive redwhip, skip past the acid burns, and jump to the next platform; all without losing momentum.

  Aiming for the side of the flat surface opposite the passive redwhip, Kopius leaped.

  As he took to the air, his world sped up. All at once the avalanche of rock reached the passive redwhip, slamming the monster, making it tumble across the sharp ground. A top the wave of stone the aggressive redwhip attempted to raise its mauling pincers but the rocks made it falter and its weapon lingered in the air longer than needed.

  Kopius was flying past the halfway mark when the wave riding redwhip regained balance and brought its hammer down. The appendage, easily five times the size of the astralsilicate that is Celeste, arced down on Kopius like an over-sized circus mallet trying to ring a bell.

  It missed his head by inches but managed to clip the backpack tucked under his cloak. The hit spun Kopius back as if he were starting a backflip or belly floating through the open air. Before he could even flail his arms and legs in panic, the blur of a redwhip tail flashed a few feet above him–where his head had been–a slice so fast he felt the wind of the blade like stinger slash by.

  He grunted loud as he crashed into the flat platform and skidded across the part of the stone still smoldering from acid. His lower leg immediately felt like it was being seared, as did his upper arm on the same side. When the smell of burnt leather broke through his ‘in the zone’ type focus, the whole world came alive with it.

  A cacophony of noises all competed to have top billing in his mind. Rocks were sliding, crunching, smashing and shattering into other rocks; acid still crackled in the long grooves it had cut; monsters scurrying and gurgling. His heart pounded in his chest; his breaths came and went in erratic bursts.

  Kopius scurried to his feet and activated his healing ring in the same motion. He didn’t bother to look at the damage, instead he embraced whatever luck had befallen him, took a quick step back to avoid a careening rock and then quickly got back to jumping.

  He leaped from the acid scarred platform as the aggressive redwhip came to a sliding stop in the sea of rock shards. By the time Kopius landed on the next platform the passive redwhip emerged from its grave of stone like Wolverine fresh from his Adamantium upgrade. The beast collectively gurgle-roared their rage. The aggressive redwhips head jerked around until it locked onto Kopius who was two steps away from jumping again.

  Kopius leaped, hit the flat rock, stuttered-stepped a short distance and bounded to the next safe space. He chanced a look back to see both redwhips giving chase; one directly on his tail while the other had scaled back up the slope, recreating the avalanche.

  On flat land, Kopius would have long been overtaken; long dead. Navigating the sea of rocks was a death sentence in more ways than one, yet the redwhips had no issues. Though Kopius couldn’t move at full speed while jumping the platforms, neither could the redwhip keeping up pace below. The thing moved across the shards more like a centipede rather than a spider and the fact that neither had tried to pounce on him yet, gave him the briefest of thoughts that the creatures couldn’t jump.

  His next leap brought him to the ‘hop, skip, jump’ portion of the trail and he navigated it like his life depended on it. After weaving through that section and jumping two more platforms, Kopius turned down the bend, briefly breaking direct contact with the redwhip. High above him, up the slope, the other redwhip had taken a shortcut of sorts as it tried to spray acid from a distance. It all splashed against the stones as it arced in his direction, not close enough to a danger.

  Behind Kopius came the crunching and crashing of the trailing redwhip making the turn down the bend. He looked from the redwhip on the hill to the redwhip on his rear and then finally to the horizon just in time to witness Cici’s large figure leap into the air and disappear beyond the platform.

  A pit formed in Kopius’s stomach as he leaped to the next platform. He felt a sudden rush of warmth, as worry spread through him. Whether it was over his friends safety or his own he would have to parse through later. Right now he was one step ahead of the redwhip and two jumps away from making the leap of his life.

  Where his mind had been clear of unnecessary chatter, he now had ‘oh-fuck’ running out of his mouth like someone with turrettes just snorted an eight-ball of Columbia’s finest. He could have competed for Micro Machines commercials if the subject matter allowed swear words.

  Kopius landed on the second to last platform and used its longer runway to pick up additional speed. He pumped his legs with more vigor and tancity than he would have given himself credit for. Though his feet glided across the stone, he could still sense them digging into the surface to generate more momentum. His arms slashed through the air as if aerodynamics were second nature.

  Landing on the final platform with the precision of an acrobat, he took two more meaningful strides and leaped out into oblivion. He hit the open air with the grace of a bird in flight. The crevasse that had turned them away before spread out wide and deep below his airborne body.

  What began as graceful evolved into a flailing mess of appendages not accustomed to long flights. Kopius turned awkwardly in the air as gravity took over and pulled him down. Fear was replaced with relief, which was immediately trounced on by panic.

  He was going to make the jump; by quite a bit actually. The landing would hurt but he would make it; that was the moment of relief. As he tumbled through the sky and across the chasm, he saw Cici clinging to the side of the pit, desperately trying to keep hold.